Within the recent box office success of stereoscopic 3D movies, 3D entertainment like 3D video and 3D TV will be brought to home entertainment, too. One of the first available solutions is the Blu-ray 3D format. This format not only supports stereoscopic 3D display of a main video stream, it also supports stereoscopic 3D display of auxiliary information like, for example, 3D menus, 3D subtitles and/or 3D interactive applications written in the Java programming language. Exemplarily, a 3D interactive menu allows the user to select a certain scene, a different audio track, etc. In the following, information that is related to 3D menus, 3D subtitles, 3D interactive applications and the like shall be referred to as auxiliary information.
According to the Blu-ray 3D format, auxiliary information may be displayed in two different modes. In a 3D mode, also referred to as a 2-planes mode, the auxiliary information is displayed stereoscopically in 3D. For stereoscopic 3D display, left and right channel information is provided by a graphics subsystem and is reproduced stereoscopically by a suitable display. A software programming interface (API) of the graphics subsystem allows communication between a program layer, typically a Java application running on the reproduction device, and the graphics subsystem. On the other hand, the graphics subsystem is capable of running in a 2D mode, also referred to as a 1-plane mode. In this mode the user is provided a 2D display of auxiliary information. Display of auxiliary information is typically independent from the reproduction of a main video content. Exemplarily, a 2D interface or menu may be displayed in front of a background 3D main video stream. The user interface for the 2D mode is backwards compatible to existing 2D programming APIs. Further, the reproduction device is typically capable of running in a standard 2D mode, which shall be referred to as a 2D mode, too.
Depending on the user scenario, it will sometimes be necessary to switch the graphics subsystem between the 3D mode and the 2D mode. This may be due to a user's instruction or may be triggered by the program layer by e.g. a timing function in the Java code. The aforementioned switching between the 3D mode and the 2D mode relates to a switching process between a stereoscopic 3D display mode and a non-stereoscopic 2D display mode. This transition has to be distinguished from known technologies pertaining to a switching process between a pseudo 3D picture, e.g. a computer generated 3D scenario that is however displayed on a flat screen, i.e. in a stereoscopic way and a usual 2D display of information.